An adequately managed inventory system is important for any business involved in the sale of goods or services. To adequately manage inventory items, businesses keep track of inventory item count. If desired, the inventory management systems maintain a sufficient amount of inventory items available, forecast the usage of inventory items, and timely re-order an appropriate amount of inventory items.
However, it is just as important to be able to place the inventory items in a manner that allows users to have easy access to the inventory items as well as to know where to access the inventory items. For example, placement of inventory items becomes important if the associated storage spaced is limited, or when existing shelves have fixed sizes. Furthermore, some inventory items may be seasonal or may otherwise require periodic movement or arrangement, and can therefore require special placement preferences while maintaining adequate accessibility to other items. Furthermore, the business may have to adhere to certain special codes such as those provided by different government agencies.
In the food service industry, for example, a primary concern of food service providers is the allocation of resources to providing items on the menu ordered by customers. With existing inventory management techniques, food service providers are able to check and track inventory items, order new inventory items from a list of suppliers when desired, log who has access to the inventory items, and log when the inventory items are accessed. Some existing methods even allow businesses to forecast inventory needs. However, the same food service providers also need to know how inventory items should be placed or stocked in order to achieve an efficient and usable inventory arrangement. For example, a food service provider may like to access its most frequently used items in a readily accessible location, may require that heavy items be located in low positions on storage shelving, and may prefer particular inventory stacking and arrangements.
These and many other inventory storage considerations must often be balanced to identify an efficient and logical inventory storage arrangement. However, due at least in part to the large number of considerations, the large array of different product types and sizes, and an overwhelming number of different possible inventory arrangements, many storage locations in various businesses remain inefficiently organized.
Many methods and techniques have been developed for some of the tasks mentioned above, such as tracking inventory items, forecasting and indicating inventory needs, and re-ordering inventory items. These types of methods, programs and techniques perform their functions generally adequately. However, these methods, programs and techniques do not elaborate or provide how and where to store and place the inventory in an efficient and logical manner.